5 Fertility Myths You Should Know When You’re Trying to Conceive

How many times have you heard that you’re supposed to ovulate on day 14 and if you’re trying to get pregnant that’s when you should be having the sex? This tip may seem helpful but it feeds into one of the most common myths about fertility! What you probably don’t know is that if you’re making sure you have sex on day 14 of your cycle you could be lowering your chances of getting pregnant.

The 5 fertility myths you should know when you’re trying to conceive:

1. You ovulate on day 14 of your cycle

If you happen to have a 28 day cycle you might ovulate on day 14, but there’s a huge problem with this line of thinking. Most women don’t have 28 day cycles every single month without fail. Furthermore, most women don’t ovulate on day 14, and even if your cycles are fairly “regular” I guarantee you that you don’t ovulate exactly on day 14 every time. It just doesn’t work that way. Believe it or not, you’re actually a human being, not a machine, and with that comes variation and fluctuations both on a monthly basis and also throughout your reproductive life.

Let’s put this into perspective: if your cycle lasts 32 days (day 1 is the first day of your period), you probably ovulated on day 17 or 18, but even if you’re able to point out what day you ovulated that month it doesn’t mean you’ll always ovulate on the same day of your cycle every single month.

Even if you do ovulate on day 14, waiting to have sex on that day could be too late because once you ovulate, the egg only survives for 12-24 hours. Your body knows this, and that’s why you make cervical mucus on the days leading up to ovulation. Cervical mucus nourishes sperm, keeps them alive, and helps them to make their way up to your fallopian tubes where they meet the egg. This ensures that by the time you ovulate the sperm are already there to fertilize the egg. What that means is that the best time to have sex when you’re trying to conceive is before ovulation on the days you see cervical mucus! This brings me to the 2nd myth.

2. The best time to have sex when you’re trying to conceive is on ovulation day

Figuring out the date you ovulate is important, but for different reasons than you might think. When you’re using fertility awareness either to get pregnant or as birth control, the most important fertility sign for you to pay attention to is cervical mucus. There is only a short window, about 5-7 days in your cycle when you can actually get pregnant, and it’s your mucus that makes your vagina sperm friendly and keeps sperm alive for up to 5 days. Without mucus your vagina actually kills off sperm left and right. When you’re trying to get pregnant the best time to have sex is on the days you see mucus, and especially on the days when you see clear, stretchy mucus, not on “ovulation day”!

3. You can ovulate more than once, and it can happen on any day of your menstrual cycle

Ovulation doesn’t just randomly happen for no reason, it is an event that happens at the end of a series of hormonal and physiological changes. Ask any woman who has PCOS or Hypothalamic Amenorrhea if ovulation “just happens” and you’ll find that this whole ovulation thing isn’t as simple as you thought it was.

In order for you to ovulate a series of hormonal events have to happen to trigger your body to release an egg. As your your follicles (eggs) develop in the first half of your cycle your estrogen level rises and eventually rises high enough to trigger your pituitary gland to release Luteinizing Hormone (LH). The surge of LH is what triggers your ovaries to burst open and release an egg. Once the egg is released your ovaries start pumping out loads of progesterone, and progesterone shuts down ovulation for the rest of your cycle. Kind of a mouthful isn’t it?

The point of that description is to demonstrate to you that your body is amazing, intelligent, and complicated. You only ovulate on one day each cycle, and it happens over one 12-24 hour period of time. Obviously you can release more than one egg during ovulation or no one would ever have fraternal twins, but if you’re going to ovulate “more than once” it’s going to happen on ovulation day: 2 eggs, 1 day. Both released within the same 12-24 hour span of time. So you can’t ovulate on Tuesday and then again on Friday. After you ovulate your body closes shop as far as ovulation is concerned!

4. Taking your temperature can help you predict ovulation

Basal Body temperature is a measure of your metabolic rate. After you ovulate your metabolism goes up (as a result of a surge in progesterone), and you can measure this shift when you take your temperature every morning. The thing is that the rise in temperature confirms that ovulation has already happened. It doesn’t predict anything. You might see a dip in your temperature the day before ovulation, but not every woman will see “the dip”. Since we already know that the most important fertility sign to pay attention to when trying to conceive is cervical mucus, although your temperature shift is extremely useful in telling you when you ovulated (past tense), you’ll want to pay close attention to your mucus and time sex based on when you have mucus instead of waiting for your temp shift.

5. You can get pregnant on any day of your cycle

I remember being taught that I could get pregnant at anytime in my cycle. I learned that every single day was a fertile day. It felt like a threat because it was never “safe” to have sex without having to worry about pregnancy. That is until I learned about fertility awareness.

There are only about 5-6 days in your cycle when it’s possible for you to get pregnant. What fertility awareness boils down to is your ability to identify which days are fertile and which days aren’t, and you do this by observing your cervical mucus patterns, changes in your cervical position, and changes in your basal body temperature.

If you consider that you can only get pregnant from unprotected sex on about 5-6 days of your cycle, then doesn’t it seem excessive to use birth control pills that prevent pregnancy 24 hours a day 7 days a week? If you think about it, you’re actually infertile most of the time. If you’ve been trying to get pregnant for awhile now you’ll recognize the irony here since it’s not always as easy to conceive. It turns out that you actually can’t get pregnant on every day of your cycle.

Now I want to hear from you! Did you still believe some of these myths? Which ones are hardest for you to let go of? Were you trying to conceive on the wrong day of your cycle? I’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments below!

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Comments

This is very helpful. I really thought tracking your BBT is the only healthy way to predict your ovulation. But this makes sense. With my experience I strongly believe that tracking your cervical mucus is the best way for TTC

during the time I was TTC i followed BBT and CM. I would notice CM starting sticky and becoming more of EWCM. I would have sex around those days, but not everyday. I also made sure cervix wadms high and soft. Most tine my cervix was too high to touch, but EWCM that streaches is very important. Once I noticed the temperature shift after ovulation by day 11 in my cycle if the temperature is still up I would take a test and it was positive as long as your luteal phase is more than 10 days then that’s a good sign charting will help you learn these things they help also in identifying problems. If you notice too short of a luteal phase no signs of ovulation temperature does not fluctuate then you should see a doctor. Both of my children were conceived according to fertility charts just based on temperature cervical mucus and cervical position. By day 11 once I have ovulated if my temperature was still high I took a pregnancy test and in my case they were both positive but if you use a chart and your temperature is up 18 days that’s almost a hundred percent guarantee you’re pregnant but take a test to make sure if it’s still negative notify your doctor and a blood test could be more accurate. Because once you see cervical mucus especially egg white where it’s very stretchy you need to act right away and don’t get up out of bed right away try to lie down for 20 minutes and then keep taking your temperature every morning and by day 18 if it’s still high then there’s a chance you’re pregnant as long as you noticed that you have ovulated that month. There is a book called taking charge of your fertility and that book is the reason I conceived three times the first time I wasn’t trying to I was told I never could have kids so I wanted to learn my body and see what was happening lo and behold that first chart I got pregnant and I wasn’t really trying I was just experimenting with the chart. However I did notice my temperature started to go down after a couple days once I knew I was pregnant and I knew something was wrong and I had an atopic so I needed to have a D&C. So my next attempt I monitored my temperature for longer to make sure it stayed up until my doctor’s appointment my second child once I had a positive I needed to go to the doctor right away do the other complications prior to my first pregnancy. If you can get that book you will be surprised on the information it has including the charts.

I’ve been trying to conceive more.or.less for about 8 months. I’ve been trying to follow my ovulation app advice and.its just.not.working. I am not trying to pay attention to my CM. I am noticing maybe water to egg white days ….. I am wondering if my last.oeeiod only lasted 2 days, if I would most.likely ovulate sooner than later?

I think I am not pregnant but had sex ( pull out method done correctly) on nigh 18/19th day of cycle I think it was after ovulation and I had no visible cervix mucus I was rather dry that day and also 2 days earlier ( my cycle is 26-28days long very regular with temperature raise on 15/16th day)
I noticed Little temperature rise on 16th day 36.8℃ ( on 14 and 15th day I had 36.6℃ on 12 and 13 I have 36.4℃ ) unfortunately I didn’t check my temperature on 17 and 18th day…
Today is 4 days after sex my temperature is 36.9℃
Should I worry?

I am trying to conceive from past 5 months.. This month i tried to track my mucus but unfortunately there was no cervical mucus coming out. Also my period is of 31 days and keeps on changing sometimes,it’s very hard to predict my ovulation day.

My BBT rises does that mean for sure I ovulate? I’m so afraid I can’t get pregnant. I was on BC for 10 years. I had a miscarriage when I was 16, so at one point I could get pregnant. My periods are irregular, they were fine before I got on BC. I think my body got messed up from BC. I’ve been off of it over a year but only been TTC for 7 months.

I have pcos.and trying to get pregnant.i didn’t get my periods for a year. What should I do ?I don’t like to use bc to get it back.coz every time Dr gave bc to get my periods back. So I stopped that.what can I do ?